


heaven's around the corner

by orphan_account



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Introspection, M/M, but that's to be expected considering what he's been through, i love yuri and otabek's friendship, this is going to get a bit angsty, yuri deserves to be loved and cared for, yuri has trust issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-12 05:10:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9056845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Promises are easy to break and hard to fullfill. That’s the lesson Yuri has learnt from the people in his life. He doesn’t want Otabek to become like any of them. Or:Yuri struggles to come to terms with his growing feelings.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> so i took this lovely person's headcanon and ran with it (http://otayurism.tumblr.com/post/154811963693/now-that-im-on-winter-break-id-really-like-to)
> 
> i'm still bitter about otabek placing fourth but i'm optimistic about the second season!!! i hope we see more of otabek then!!  
> let me know what you think of it so far!!!

The gold medal weighs heavily on his chest. Not as heavy as the feeling he gets when he remembers that he won’t be seeing Otabek in a while now that the Grand Prix Final is over, but close enough anyway.

He’s happy about his win; he’d fought tooth and nail for this, and the news that Katsudon would retire after the competition had only served to spur him on. He still can’t believe that the thought had crossed the Piggy’s mind—to give up so easily. Yuri had stayed up several nights watching his videos after all. (He’d rather die than admit this very fact to Katsudon.) If he’d wanted to retire he would’ve done so after his shameful performance during the last Grand Prix Final. The one thing he’s come to learn about Yuuri is that he has a resolve not unlike his own; hard as stone and unyielding to any obstacle. He’d realised this during the Onsen on Ice, when Yuuri had become a different person on ice—oozing confidence and self-appeal; even though he hadn’t stayed to watch all of it, it still had made Yuri develop a sort of admiration towards him. (Again, he’d never reveal this to anyone. Least of all Yuuri.) Yuri is also happy about Katsudon’s silver and how this means that he won’t be retiring until he’s at least won gold. Something Yuri is adamant about trying to stop him from doing.

The only thing he’s bitter about is Otabek’s placement. _How the fuck did that asshole JJ win bronze after making so many mistakes?_ His short program was a mess. His free program was less of a mess but still bad enough for him to deserve fourth place. Not fucking third.

Otabek’s performance may have lost points in presentation but his technical score should’ve been more than enough for him to win that bronze. Although Yuri had only managed to catch the end of his program—what he’d seen had been mesmerising. His jumps were out-of-this-world. His presence on the ice sent shivers down Yuri’s spine as he’d stood to wait for his turn.

”Yuri!”

Yuri’s shaken awake from his internal musings to the sight of Otabek’s fast approach. His long legs are clad in black jeans and Yuri also notices that he’s wearing the same scarf he’d worn when they’d first met. He reaches Yuri in no time and stops a few steps in front of him.

 _I wish he’d stand a little closer to me_ , Yuri thinks absently before he violently shakes his head. _What the fuck? Why would he want that?_

The action causes Otabek to gaze at him curiously and Yuri can only stare at him in return, unsure of what to say. _Otabek has really long eyelashes._ The thought startles him so much that he hurries to find something to say.

”Otabek, I—”

”Yuri—”

They both pause and stare at each other. Yuri smiles at him and remembers that they’re both new to this friendship thing. His body loses all its tension.

”It’s fine, Otabek, you can go first,” He says, gesturing with his hand toward him.

Otabek smiles, a dimple appearing from his left cheek. Yuri feels his eyes zoning in on it; the way it softens his face and makes him appear younger than he actually is. _He’s handsome._ This realisation makes Yuri’s whole face feel warm. He decides to stare at the ground in an effort to keep these unbidden thoughts from resurfacing again.

”Yuri, I’m leaving in a few hours to fly back to Almaty,” Otabek begins, shuffling his feet, ”I just wanted to say goodbye before I leave,”

At this, Yuri looks up. His chest feels heavy again. He’d know this was going to happen but hearing it from Otabek doesn’t make it any less painful.

He nods to show that he’s aware of the fact, and swallows down the bitterness that comes with it.

”I promise to visit you in Russia, Yura.”

Yuri studies Otabek’s face instead. He studies his strong jaw and the thick eyelashes framing his brown eyes. Brown eyes that are staring at him in concern.

Yuri doesn’t want him to leave. He doesn’t want to have this friendship broken into fragments too delicate to put back together again. He’s tired of promises. Promises are easy to break and hard to fullfill. That’s the lesson Yuri has learnt from the people in his life. He doesn’t want Otabek to become like any of them. The reminder leaves a sour taste in his mouth.

He nods again and quickly turns around. He doesn’t want Otabek to see his glistening eyes and trembling lips either. He throws a casual (Or what he hopes came out casual. He was fighting back tears after all.) ”Goodbye, Otabek” over his shoulder, and walks briskly back to his hotel.

 

Only there, in the safety of his hotel room, does he allow the tears to fall.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this took so long!! my laptop broke down so i had to wait a few days before buying a new one... luckily i found a good one on sale so there's that... anyway this chapter was inspired by something i read-- something to do with what kubo-sensei said... she mentioned in an interview that if the main character of yoi had been yurio then the show would have become sad (in regards to his backstory)
> 
> so yeah please let me know what you think-- and thank you to all of you who left lovely comments and kudos!!!

**Yuri had his first promise broken at the age of nine.**

It had been the day of his second official competition and Yuri had woken up with a nervous fluttering in the pit of his stomach. It wasn’t the fear of failure nor was it the type of sickness that comes with nerves. No, Yuri felt excitement coursing through him, almost dizzying in its intensity.

He threw his bedcovers onto the floor in his hurry to move his bedroom curtains aside and look out of the window. It was a cloudless, grey day with thick mist hanging in the sky; something that usually would invoke a sense of foreboding inside of him. _But not today_ , he thought to himself.

The neighbourhood was quiet this time of the day; the hubbub of people gathering in the streets to walk to the nearby Saturday market was nowhere to be seen, and a glance towards his alarm clock told him it was a little past six o’clock. They’d be up and about around midday, Yuri knew. The same time he was scheduled to skate his short program.

Looking out again, the only thing he could hear was the faint mewling of a stray cat and nothing else. There wasn’t anything that indicated that this was a special morning— a special day.

Yuri sighed and started to prepare himself for the day ahead.

 

The competition was to be held in one of Moscow’s largest ice rink; promising a large audience and an even larger atmosphere. Many skaters were sure to take this chance to stand out, to earn the respect from their hometown, and to catch the attention of the dozens of scouters who watched with scrutinizing eyes at the skaters’ routines— in search for new talent to invest in. Yuri knew all of this. It didn’t make him nervous in the slightest. Some of his rink mates liked to call him “overconfident”; he had also heard his coach, on more than one occasion, call him “a disrespectful brat who was too full of himself.”  

_None of it mattered though.  He was going to prove them all wrong on the ice._

He had been in the middle of serving himself breakfast when he’d sensed a presence behind him. Surprised, and more than a little unsettled, Yuri had turned around, nearly dropping his bowl of cereal.

His mother was standing in the kitchen, a frown marring her beautiful features, and Yuri didn’t know if he was the sole reason behind the annoyance she exuded this time or if it was directed towards her life, and at the rest of the world. He chanced a glance at her thin frame and saw that she was wearing yesterday’s dishevelled clothes. This didn’t surprise him nearly as much as her unannounced visit to the kitchen. Stepping aside of him, she started making herself some coffee, all the while studiously ignoring her own son.

Yuri was used to this distance between them, but it still hurt to have it reaffirmed every time they happened to be in the same room. He finished preparing his breakfast and made his way upstairs, to eat in the too-familiar silence. He shook himself rid of all the sad thoughts his mother’s behaviour tended to bring. Nothing was going to distract him from earning his newest personal best today.

He was downstairs an hour later—freshly showered and dressed— with his bag containing his skates and costume slung over one shoulder, when the sound reached him. It sounded like someone was singing.

Yuri walked quietly to the kitchen and was greeted to the sight of his mother wearing an apron, something she never did, and cleaning the kitchen. She was humming a lullaby to herself—one that she used to sing for him when he was younger, and she was happier. It was almost as if she was back to normal; the mother who used to kiss him goodnight and sing for him whenever he’d wake up from a nightmare. Not this shadow of a woman who forgot about herself, throughout the years, and eventually her son.

After the disappearance of his father, when Yuri had been four and first taken up figure skating, his mother rarely did anything apart from working herself weary to the bone on the weekdays at the local elderly’s home, and drinking herself to a stupor on the weekends.  Yuri had found her once, sprawled on the sofa, sobbing while clutching a bottle of wine. He’d waited till her sobbing had ceased to soft sniffling before asking her why she liked to drink so much. She’d stared at him; her eyes bloodshot and her face wiped clean of any emotion, and in a flat tone told him that it helped her to forget.

Yuri had never asked her anything after that.

(In a moment of childish naiveté, as he will remember it as in his adolescent years, he asks the question that will ultimately destroy him. A question born out of hope and desperation— of a _need_ to have his mother acknowledge him with more than stiff nods and stony silences.)

“Mother,” he asked in a timid voice, “will you come to watch me perform today?”

He waited for a few beats. His mother didn’t answer and seemed intent on scrubbing clean the kitchen tiles.

He asked again, a little louder this time. “Will you come to watch me perform today?”

Her hand paused. She looked his way and her eyes flitted to the bag he was carrying. She looked at him for what felt like minutes.

“Alright, Yuratchka,” she finally said, and resumed her scrubbing. “I will ask your grandfather for the time and place.”

Yuri couldn’t help the happiness that filled him at this— his grandfather _and_ his mother coming to see him perform. It almost felt too good to be true.

“Promise?” He asked in a stronger voice.

His mother turned to look at him and smiled. “I promise.”

 

* * *

Yuri stepped off the ice, having finished the group warm-up and moved to stand near the kiss-and-cry section of the rink. His deduskha had driven him to the rink this morning; gifting him with a paper bag full of freshly baked pirozkhis before placing a kiss on his cheek and wishing him luck.

He had left the car feeling warm and content.

_I can do this. I will skate a clean programme today. I will make my family proud of me._

The same thoughts were circulating through his mind like a broken record ten minutes before he was due to skate. He’d caught a glimpse of his grandfather a while ago and knew that he was watching. The same couldn’t be said of his mother.

 _Maybe she’s just running late_ , he reassured himself with, _maybe she’s on her way here right now._

He concentrated on his fellow competitor instead. The boy skating before him was a year older and was already making attempts at triple jumps. Yuri knew competition when he saw it. This boy wasn’t it.

The boy, Sergei, as the announcer had called him, bowed deeply to the audience before skating to the outstretched arms of his coach.

Yuri scoffed, and took his blade guards off.

_It doesn’t matter. Nobody else mattered now. It was his turn to skate and his turn to prove himself._

With a deep exhale, Yuri took to the ice.

The opening notes of ‘Dans Macabre’ filled the rink. He moved his body to the music, to the crescendo of the symphony. He readied himself for a triple axel and—

He landed it.

The audience’s cheering sounded distant to his own ears, over the sound of the music and the pounding of his heart. It was almost like he was flying through the ice. His body was his to control and he was landing jump after jump with ease he’d never felt before.

All too soon, the music slowed until its last notes were reverberating through the silent ice rink. Yuri clasped his hands together, in his ending pose, and waited.

The audience’s instantaneous cheering woke him up from the trance he’d been under. A few flower bouquets were strewn over the ice the ice but Yuri had no eyes for any of it.

Quickly, his eyes scanned the stands until they reached his grandfather. His beloved deduskha. He was clapping with a wide smile on his face. His smile disappeared, however, when his eyes met Yuri’s and he seemed to be recalling the conversation they’d had on their way to the ice rink—about Yuri’s mother coming to see his performance. His grandfather shook his head slightly—something that’d look imperceptible to anyone else—but Yuri knew what it meant. He pushed down every feeling that threatened to well up at the sight of it, and skated to his coach, who was ushering him towards the kiss-and-cry.

Yuri looked at his score with glazed eyes; 69.75 for his short program— a number unheard of at his age. Yuri could only nod at his coach’s praise, all the wishing for the event to end so he could just _forget._ He wanted to forget about ever making her promise him to show up. His only family was his grandfather, after all. He should’ve been happy with that. Yuri was a greedy boy though —his mother used to say the same thing—and he always wanted _more._

Sometimes wanting more meant getting _nothing._ Another lesson he’d do well to remember, it seemed.

 

“I’m so proud of you, Yuratchka,” his grandfather was saying, on their way home from the rink, “you did well.”

“Thank you, deduskha.” Yuri replied, his lips stretching into a smile.

It’d become apparent then, when his mother hadn’t called to apologise for her failure to show up, or even to congratulate him on his performance, that she truly didn’t care about him. He’d been too trusting of her—too enraptured by the glimpse he’d seen of her past self—to steel himself for the possibility of his wish not being granted.

(The truth hurt more than he’d thought it would.

He’d been ignoring the pain in his chest all throughout the remainder of the evening to watch the other skaters. He’d blinked away the press of tears behind his eyes in order to force them down. A few managed to slip out anyway.)

_I should’ve known she wasn’t going to come._

Yuri gave a weary sigh at the thought.

 

He made a vow to himself later that night. He wasn’t going to trust anyone to keep their promise anymore. His grandfather was the only person he could trust.

 _It’s better this way_ , he’d thought to himself, his resolve made stronger by the way the broken promise still hurt—still fresh like a newly cut wound.

He settled down in his bed, his body exhausted by the day’s events, and waited for sleep to come to him. Relief flooded him when it did.

 

* * *

**The second time he had his promise broken, Yuri had been thirteen.**

(Granted, it hadn’t happened during the course of one day; it’d been a promise made to him that’d be fulfilled in a few years’ time. It’d seemed more believable at the time— more professional. Yuri should’ve known better. Maybe that’s why it’d destroyed him as much as it did. )

It was the promise Victor had made to him when Yuri had been thirteen and had already made himself a name in the Russian figure skating circles. ‘The Russian Fairy,’ the media liked to call him. All it meant was that they liked the way he skated—with the reckless abandon only a child could display but still capable of showing a grace on the ice that was far beyond his years. They also liked to call him Victor’s successor. Yuri hated being associated with Victor in this way more than he hated the stupid name. At least the moniker was his to bear, even though it made him cringe every time he was reminded of it, whereas the latter meant that he was taking after Victor— following in his footsteps. Yuri wasn’t going to try to emulate Victor in a bid to become the best.  He was going to surpass him.

_He’d show them all._

Training with Yakov was hard work. He expected his skaters to follow his orders without complaint and rest when he yelled at them to. Yuri did neither of these things.

In the beginning, he’d only wanted to skate for his grandfather who, without fail, showed up to his all of his competitions. His relationship with his mother was strained but that was because he never saw her. The sudden bout of illness she’d complained of one morning when he’d been eleven had developed into liver failure. Her excessive drinking had been the cause of this, Yuri knew, but that didn’t mean he’d visit her at the hospital. He only made sure the hospital bills were paid for. Every gold he’d accumulated this far had been for this very purpose. Someone had to do it. Fate had decided that it’d be him.

Living with his grandfather made his life easier though. He was living off his measly pension and yet he always managed to have enough food and warmth to share. Yuri was grateful for him.

He loved his deduskha with every fibre of his being.

He’d been in the middle of his free program when he’d felt the urge to prove himself yet again. Yuri had seen Victor talk to Yakov during his warm-up and knew that he’d be watching. Quadruple jumps were off-limits for his young body, Yakov insisted on telling him during every practice. As if he hadn’t heard it a million times before.

Yuri felt a surge of confidence and knew that the quadruple salchow was within his reach. He’d spent early mornings at the rinks, before practice officially began, to practice on his own.

He could do it.

Yuri jumped. He counted till four while he was in the air, and managed to land, albeit a little wobbly. He had done it.

The audience collectively gasped.

_How did you like that, Yakov?_

Yakov was far from impressed.

He shouted at him and started a lecture about how Yuri should know his limits, and how his body would fail him one day when he was on the cusp of glory. Yuri ignored all of this in favour of loudly blowing his nose, when a calm voice interrupted Yakov mid-tirade.

“Oh, Yakov,” Victor said, leaning on the railing of the stands, “I used to do the same jumps at his age too.”

This only served to infuriate Yakov even more. “I didn’t ask for your opinion, Victor!”  He barked, clenching his fists, “You always do whatever you want without any regard to the people around you!”

Victor gave a thin smile and directed his attention to Yuri instead. “You’re very good for your age, Yuri,” he began, “but I know that you can win your first Junior Grand Prix without any quads. In fact, I’d be willing to bet on it,”

Yuri turned to look at him, his mind shifting gears.

He needed the quads to win the Junior Grand Prix and as much as he hated to admit that Yakov was right, there was the possibility of it producing a stain on his still young body.

 _He might be right_. Yuri thought, his brow furrowed. _I know that I have the talent to win and that I’m already leagues above any skater in the junior division._

Yuri stared at him and, against his better judgement, felt a familiar hope bubbling in his chest.

If he could win and continue to pay for his mother’s hospital stay, all the while keeping his programs quads-free, it’d lessen the pressure. He wasn’t overly confident he could land those jumps scotch-free at all the time anyway.

A plan was taking shape in his head. He could make Victor do him a favour in return. After all, Victor was the one who was willing to bet on him winning.

“All right!” Yuri shot back, “If I win, you have to choreograph a program for me!”

Victor smiled widely at his enthusiasm. 

“Come find me when you’re ready to move up to the senior division. I promise that I’ll give you the best senior debut ever.”

He held out a hand. Yuri stared at it.

_Another promise? Could he really trust Victor to keep it? On the other hand, if he forgets, I can always forcefully remind him._

With a self-satisfied smile, Yuri stretched his arm out to shake Victor’s hand.

****

He threw himself into his training every day with a vigour that was fuelled by all his winnings. At the age of fifteen, Yuri had already received international fame over his Junior Worlds Championship win. Every one recognized him in his home country and he’d made enough money that would last his grandfather at least another year.

His mother had died the year before. Her condition had worsened one day while he was in practice and at the sound of his grandfather’s pained voice, Yuri had all but ran to the hospital.

He had made it too late and by the time he’d finally reached her room, the nurses told him that she had quietly passed away.

Yuri had felt numb. He remembers returning to the ice rink in a daze, his teeth painfully gritted. Yakov had cast worried glances his way, and even Mila had laid off him for the rest of the day but Yuri hadn’t reacted to any of it.

Now that he was fifteen, and ready to move up to the senior division, nothing else mattered. Not the agony that accompanied the memories of his mother that his mind would be overfilled with on nights his body was sore and he longed for nothing but sleep. (Not even the voice in the back of his head that told him that he would never have someone other than his grandfather to tell him how much he's improved—how much he's changed.) Yuri was good at pretending his anger was anger alone and not something laced with regret and self-pity. 

He needed Victor to do good on his promise now. It was time for him to choreograph his programs and give him the promised “best senior debut ever.” Yuri knew Victor was prone to forgetting things sometimes, but he surely couldn’t have forgotten this.

He only found out later how wrong he was.

 

**_Victor Nikiforon’s decision to be the coach of one Yuuri Katsuki_**

**_Nikiforov was spotted earlier this week in Hasetsu, Japan, on what was thought to be a leisurely trip. Many were surprised, however, when he announced his decision to train Yuuri Katsuki till the Grand Prix Final._ **

**_CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE_**

He’d booked the first flight he could find after he’d finished reading the news. It’d come as a shock but, luckily, Yuri knew how to shake off such feelings. Bringing back Victor had been priority then.

Victor had proposed a challenge to them both: the winner would have their wish granted by Victor.

Yuri would skate to Agape, while Yuuri would skate to Eros.

The music Victor had planned for him to skate to hadn’t been something Yuri would have picked himself. The theme of unconditional love, a topic that Victor had kept talking about during their practice of the routine, hadn’t been something he was used to either. At least, the waterfall had helped him make a revelation of some sorts—that the source of his agape was his grandfather.

Losing had hurt, even with the thought of his grandfather spurring him on during the first half of his performance. He’d panicked during the second half and that had made him lose his focus even more.

 _I’m better than this_ , he’d thought to himself, before bowing to the audience.

A broken promise again. It hadn’t been painful this time—it had been more of a bitter realisation that Yuri wasn’t special to anyone other than his grandfather.

It’d served as a stark reminder that Yuri wasn’t _good_ enough either—wasn’t _strong_ enough. At least, not yet.

Even Victor, who Yuri had thought had seen some potential in him, had cast him aside to train the other Yuuri. The pudgy, talentless Yuuri. Of course, Yuri knew that he wasn’t entirely talentless; he’d kept a close eye on him during the Grand Prix Final last year after all. His step sequence was nothing to sneer at. His jumps however…

Yuri sighed and started lacing his skates.

_He’d made it this far on his own. He could make it to the top on his own as well._


End file.
